Federal judge dismisses charges in Hunter Biden laptop case

Justice Department may still seek a grand jury indictment

U.S. Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui dismissed a criminal complaint on Monday against former FBI officials Nikki Floris and Bradley Benavides. The complaint accused them of making false statements to Congress about their involvement in and knowledge of the Hunter Biden laptop inquiry. Their lawyers had pressed for dismissal of the charges.

Faruqui said the investigation that produced the charges was rushed, overtly political and marked by “critical mistakes.” “What has transpired here cannot be described as anything other than weaponization,” Faruqui said.

The Justice Department may still pursue a grand jury indictment against Floris and Benavides. The dismissal nevertheless represented a setback for the department, particularly given its difficulty persuading grand juries in the nation’s capital to return indictments. Faruqui had described the investigation as overtly political.

The judge noted that the FBI investigation opened one day after a primetime speech by President Donald Trump that rehashed grievances over his 2020 election loss. Faruqui also said FBI Director Kash Patel mandated the investigation and kept close watch over it. Faruqui said the Justice Department could have brought the case at any time because the statements at issue were made in 2023, but opted to do so two weeks ago, in the run-up to Tuesday’s midterm voting. “I will not bury my head in the sand and pretend that I cannot read a calendar,” he said.

Faruqui’s concerns about the case were apparent almost immediately, when he raised questions about why the Justice Department had charged the case through a criminal complaint — more typically used when investigators have a pressing need to take a defendant into custody — rather than an indictment requiring a grand jury’s approval. At a preliminary hearing last week, he criticized the Justice Department for filing overnight an amended complaint with an additional criminal charge straight to the docket instead of first clearing the new charge with the court. He said he had never seen that happen before.

The decision followed a hearing at which Faruqui scolded prosecutors for their unorthodox maneuvers. An FBI agent who worked the case testified that the investigation began right after Trump gave an election security speech last July. The agent also said Patel had mandated the investigation while keeping close watch over it. The agent said he had been concerned the investigation would be seen as “political.”

The dismissed complaint accused Floris and Benavides of misleading Congress in 2023 about their involvement in and knowledge of efforts to investigate the laptop. The Justice Department said Hunter Biden, former President Joe Biden’s son, dropped the computer off at a Delaware computer repair shop in 2019.

The Justice Department’s case also sought to echo longstanding grievances by Trump and his Republican allies that the FBI attempted to suppress information during the 2020 presidential campaign that was seen as potentially harmful to the Biden family. Candidate Joe Biden, a Democrat, ultimately defeated Trump, the Republican incumbent, in the 2020 election.

The Justice Department’s case noted that Floris and Benavides gave lawmakers in 2020 a “defensive briefing” that Republican Sens. Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin have said was used to undermine their investigation into the Biden administration and link it to Russian disinformation.